BATH, Maine — With President-elect Donald Trump demanding more ships, the Navy is proposing the biggest shipbuilding boom since the end of the Cold War to meet threats from a resurgent Russia and saber-rattling China.

The Navy's 355-ship proposal released last month is even larger than what the Republican Trump had promoted on the campaign trail, providing a potential boost to shipyards that have struggled because budget caps that have limited money funding for ships.

At Maine's Bath Iron Works, workers worried about the future want to build more ships but wonder where the billions of dollars will come from.
https://www.navytimes.com/articles/n...since-cold-war

In a brief but illuminating interview, US Navy Vice Admiral#Tom Rowden, the commander of the US Navy's Surface forces, told Defense News'#Christopher P. Cavas a key difference between the ships of the US and Chinese#navies.#
Cavas asked Rowden about China commissioning a 4,000 ton frigate and deploying it just six weeks later, a start-to-finish speed inconceivable in the US Navy, where ships undergo many rounds of testing and often take more than one year to deploy.

When asked#about the differences between the US and China's processes, Rowden#explained that while a US and a Chinese ship may both appear combat-ready,"[o]ne of them couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag and the other one will rock anything that it comes up against."
Rowden couched his criticism well, but the meaning is clear. The US doesn't test its#ships for fun, or to spend excess money in the budget, but "to be 100 percent confident in the ship and confident in the execution of any mission leadership may give them."
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/comman...222602690.html